Mir Ishfaq, currently serving as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India, holds a Bachelor's degree in Metallurgical Engineering from the National Institute of Technology Srinagar, earned in 2014. Following this, Mir pursued a Master's degree in Materials Engineering from Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, completing it in 2017. Mir continued his academic journey by pursuing and successfully completing his PhD at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in March 2024. Throughout his academic journey, Mir has published three papers in peer-reviewed international journals and has actively participated in several national and international conferences. Mir’s research interests predominantly lie in Pyrometallurgy, Metallurgical thermodynamics, and Steelmaking.

Oleg Ostrovski is currently an emeritus professor at the School of Materials Science and Engineering, UNSW. He has been working in the field of pyrometallurgical technologies for minerals processing, iron-, steel-, and ferroalloy-making for more than 40 years. Prof Ostrovski’s major research areas include thermodynamics, kinetics and mechanisms of metallurgical reactions; properties of molten metals and slags; reduction, smelting and refining processes; and environmental issues in pyrometallurgy.

Dr Zushu Li is a Professor in Metallurgy at the Advanced Steel Research Centre (ASRC), WMG, of the University of Warwick, United Kingdom. He joined the University of Warwick in April 2016 as a Principal Research Fellow after being awarded the prestigious EPSRC Manufacturing Fellowship (Sustainable Steel Manufacturing). He was previously a Principal Scientist Steelmaking in Tata Steel R&D (based in the UK) and has worked in Tata Steel for nearly 10 years. Prior to working for Tata Steel, Dr Li worked at Chongqing University (China), Kyushu Institute of Technology (Japan) and Imperial College London (UK). Prof Li specializes in studying high temperature reactions/phenomena of multicomponent systems in metal manufacturing processes. At ASRC, he leads the research and education in decarbonisation of the steel industry (net zero steel manufacturing). His main research directions include low carbon, low energy alternative ironmaking technology, steel scrap recycling and scrap based EAF steelmaking process, green hydrogen-based steel manufacturing, steel circularity, and energy and materials recovery in steelmaking.

Study programm: Ceramics – Montanuniversitaet Leoben PhD study– Montanuniversitaet Leoben: Characterisation of mold powders and slags Senior Scientist – Montanuiversitaet Leoben Development of new mold poder and slag compositions for the continuous casting of steels

Masakatsu Hasegawa is an associate professor at Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan. His work focuses on thermochemical properties of oxides and alloys for environmental-friendly steelmaking. He learned chemical thermodynamics from late Professor Masanori Iwase.